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By Debbie Schlussel
It’s tax-filing season. Did Farrukh Sohail do your taxes?
If you’re one of the many Americans who hired someone at one of his 125 Jackson-Hewitt franchises around the nation, you might have reason to worry. And reason to wonder where the money you paid his Jackson-Hewitt franchises to do your taxes actually went.
Tax returns prepared at Pakistani-born Sohail’s J-H franchises bilked the federal government out of $70 million in phony tax deductions and other schemes.

The feds raided and shut down most of Sohail’s franchises in Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit, and Raleigh, North Carolina. And they filed suit against Sohail and some of his key managers and operators. Not surprisingly, of the 55 branches of Jackson-Hewitt shut-down, the names of Sohail’s Detroit-based managers named in a federal suit are mostly Muslim, like Sohail, himself:

In Detroit, the franchises targeted are run by So Far Inc. Local owners and managers named are Maquit Hasnie, Tracey Pawczuk, Nafees Hasnie, Anita Alidino and Sohail Ali. The suit says the offices filed returns claiming refunds based on phony W-2s and used fabricated business expenses for deductions.
The offices also are charged with overlooking hundreds of bogus W-2s and turning a blind eye to organized W-2 fraud.
In addition, preparers solicited kickbacks for inflated refund claims and charged fees to provide Social Security numbers filers could use as dependents to get larger refunds, the suit claims.
The offices also are accused of engaging in “massive fraud” related to the earned income credit. The complaint says 67 percent of returns from So Far/Jackson Hewitt claimed the credit, three times the 22 percent Michigan average.

So, where did Sohail send his profits? Where did his managers send the all-cash “kickbacks”? Was some of the money “sent back home” to Pakistan or elsewhere in the Islamic world to finance jihadist activities? We may never know.
But one thing we do know is that Sohail pulled-off quite a tax-scam jihad against the U.S. government before he got caught. More from AP from last week:

The government said Tuesday it is trying to shut down more than 125 Jackson Hewitt tax preparation stores in four states for systematic “tax-fraud schemes.”
The Justice Department accuses the franchises of bilking the government out of more than $70 million through fraudulent practices such as using phony W-2 forms, bogus deductions and fuel tax credits and false claims regarding the earned income tax credit.
Jackson Hewitt Tax Services Inc. is the nation’s second largest tax preparer. The franchises were either totally or partially owned by Farrukh Sohail, the Justice Department said, and involved “a pervasive and massive series of tax-fraud schemes,” according to court filings.
Sohail and other defendants “created, directed, fostered, and maintained a business environment” at the Jackson Hewitt franchises “in which fraudulent tax return preparation is encouraged and flourishes,” according to court documents.
Employees were encouraged to ignore telltale signs of fraudulent information and to file claims even when it was obvious customers were using fake W-2 forms or false deductions.
A sample of returns prepared by franchises connected to Sohail found 31 percent contained false information such as phony earned income tax credit claims, bogus deductions and fraudulent W-2 forms.
The suits, filed in federal courts in Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit and Raleigh, N.C., also allege that managers and employees at the Jackson Hewitt franchises took kickbacks for filing fraudulent returns.

Reader John has been following the story, which raised red flags in his mind, too:

I was curious if you are following the story of the 125 Jackson Hewitt franchises being investigated by the Justice Department for “a pervasive and massive series of tax-fraud schemes.” The loss to the U.S. government is currently estimated at $70 million. The franchises were owned by Farrukh Sohail (originally from Pakistan). Many of them are in the Detroit area. The operators of the Detroit-area franchises include several with obviously Muslim names. It makes you wonder how much of the fraudulent profits was sent overseas.

So did Farrukh Sohail do your taxes? And if so, where did the money you paid him go? We already know he committed economic tax-fraud jihad against the U.S. What would stop him from also committing the physical kind of jihad, overseas (or even here)?

6 Responses

Okay, NOT paying taxes is suddenly UN-American…WTF???!!!!
PERSONALLY i’d like to see Okarh work with the Nation of Islam and create a scholarship which would give every Nigro and ‘wetback’ male graduating from high school a Glock 9 and a thousand rounds of ammo…then WE could bullet the ballot…but WE don’t have any SAY in where OUR DredScotted tax dollar$ go, do WE???

The Nation of Islam is not even real Islam. Islam is a false religion/cult. Anyways that $70 mil went to terrorists. Pakistan is probably the biggest haven for Terrorists in the Middle East as its the most populated Islamic nation.

Hey *the_don,* i AGREE that the NOI is not real Islam, the PROPHET Malcolm [X] showed us that…and i DO agree that Islam MAY be a false religion…but THAT is predicated upon the assumption that Christianity is even more false!
IF you take some time out to study history you’ll discover that the “son of god” myth was CREATED by the same schmucks who put PALESTINE on the map…’Christianity’ is one of the oldest tools of IMPERIALISM on the planet!!!
Put some Bob Marley on your iPod, roll up a spliff, and JAH RASTAFARI is as poten a chant as HARE KRISHNA…KRISHNA KRISHNA…HARE RAMA…

This is no surprise. I used to work for HRB and it is very easy to get bad returns past the IRS. It happens daily. The IRS system is so messed up that it takes more than a year for the IRS to catch misfilings, sometimes even more. They then charge the customer interest for the year it took to figure out it was a mistake. My favorite misfiling is a women who was claiming her mother as a dependent and then filing a claim for CDC (Child and Dependent Car). To claim CDC you must have paid someone to care for that person. You are required to get and SSN or EID. She put her own SSN down and claimed the max allowed. 4 (yes four) years after having continually misfiled, she came to my office and was upset that I would not file the claim.
Is it any wonder our govenrment can’t keep track of money.

You know who EminemsRevenge reminds me of? This old sketch on In Living Color with Damon Wayans. Just the way EminemsRevenge puts weird EMPHASIS on his words reminds me of the way Damon Wayans speaks in this sketch:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lc4tUFWCHdg

Yeah,I worked for JH in richmond va.I noticed muslim garbed women in last years orientation.Further more Virginia is home to several jaamat al fuqura cells.Felt as safe as a long tailed cat in a room of rocking chairs.Fortunately I dont work there anymore.My first year I didnt see anyone who appeared muslim.Last year that changed.
The basic climate of JH is one that would allow
terrorist cells to use it as a economic base though.They punish
qualified preparers who actually do their job.They dont want you to question your clients information unless its obvious its
fraudulent.Dont put a return on hold.Dont void a return.They will have a kitten about it.Never mind that the reason is legitimate.My answer was to ignore it and do my job correctly.
Furthermore I found where a terrorist cell[specifically targeting our military] with the use of id theft could have generated a pretty penny.I explained it to my supervisor who looked at me as though I was cerbaris.They laughed and thought I was stupid.I uncovered several cases of w2 fraud directed against the employee.Their reaction to this wasnt quite as bad but not far from it.My background in the tax field came from someone who did business corporate taxes from the war torn 40s through the early 70s.Through three wars with all the financial crimes associated with all.JH just insulted all the training I had and laughed at me.They insulted me to the point I wont ever work for any tax company.
As you can plainly see a terrorist cell has no problem with this type of set up.Id suggest that doj and the feds might want to keep an eye out for all JH offices in virginia.